Book of the Week: The Rest is Weight by Jennifer Mills

Award-winning author Jennifer Mills (Gone, The Diamond Anchor) is an exciting voice in contemporary Australian literature and the short stories in her new book, The Rest is Weight, are a pleasure to read.

A girl searches for her lost grandmother while her parents quarrel at home. A young architect finds herself entangled by a strange commission. A man contemplates inertia after toxic fallout changes life in a remote Australian town. A woman imagines a mother’s love for her autistic son.

These stories are poetic and evocative; many read almost like prose poems or vignettes. Jessica Au says in her recent review, ‘Her background as a poet … comes through strongly. There’s a precision and coolness to the words, as well as a palette of moods and tones, that go towards creating beautifully varied worlds.’

We were excited to read of Mills’s recent appointment as the new fiction editor of Overland and are looking forward to seeing how her influence might spread.